


Broken

by Heather C (riteinthefeels)



Series: Take Me Out [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-09
Updated: 2014-01-09
Packaged: 2018-01-08 04:04:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1128115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/riteinthefeels/pseuds/Heather%20C
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Found another prompt: <a href="http://awesomeflotsam.tumblr.com/post/69157382120/leveling-thor-in-marvel-heroes">"I sometimes hear those boot steps in my nightmares."</a></p><p>Part 1 of 3.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken

Though the glamour restored when he set down the Casket, covering marks that betrayed his monstrous lineage, Loki’s skin still felt cool as he walked through a haze to his quarters. His mother—though she wasn’t his mother, was she? Frigga had bore him no more than Odin had sired him.

Frigga kept watch over the Allfather, and Loki left to find a quiet place to think. Regent, in the interim that Odin slept and Thor remained on Midgard. He may as well be crowned king. Frigga herself admitted no knowledge of how long the Odinsleep would last.

Thor: well, Thor was a lost cause. Frigga claimed that Odin had a plan, but when the Allfather had cast out his eldest—his _only_ —son, Loki saw an old warrior reacting to a threat by disposing of it, not a wise king acting in the best interest of his realm.

With a weak Allfather and no heir, it fell to Loki, born of an obsolete king, to rule the nine realms, to succeed where both of his fathers had failed. He drifted through his door, letting it slam shut behind him. Everything made so much more sense now that he knew whose blood stormed through his veins, and the unnatural coolness of his room only served to remind him that he did not belong in Asgard.

Then again, being cast out by his own kin, Jotunheim held no comfort for him either.

He pulled off his boots, leaving them upright beside a bedpost, and crawled under luxuriant furs. Being king could wait, at least a few hours. Already, the weight of duty threatened to crush him under relentless beckoning. Heavy eyelids finally pulled the curtain on his racing thoughts.

~*~

Mere moments had passed, and noise in the hall dragged Loki, disoriented and agitated, from the edge of rest. Heavy footfalls plucked at the edges of his mind, and the muffled scrape of leather over leather filtered through his ears. His door creaked open despite the locking enchantment, and torchlight from the corridor flickered around an amorphous hulk as it oozed into the vacant space.

“Thor?” Loki asked, wiping sleep from his eyes. “How did you get back?”

The thunderer’s face, half-lit by the fire in Loki’s hearth, housed a clenched jaw and wild eyes. He raised Mjolnir from his side, sparks dancing across her surface, and flung her at the bed. It broke down the middle, feathers and straw raining on furs like confetti, but the trickster’s lifeless body did not lie upon it.

In the hall, Loki clutched the cold wall at his back and shivered, gasping as his heart raced. The same heavy steps rang out from his room, and he ran down the hall in his stocking feet and grappled around the nearest corner, wedging himself behind a column.

“ _Loki!_ ” Thor snarled, Mjolnir thudding back into his hand. “There is nowhere you can run that I will not find you!”

He tried to hold his breath as the boot steps approached. Thor swung his hammer through the column, and Loki gulped as the thunderer tightened his grip for the return blow. Loki teleported down the hall, and Mjolnir whistled through the space he had occupied. He dashed down the corridor, searching wildly for the servants’ passage he had used countless times before.

The sliding door, though well-concealed within the wall, should have given way to his probing fingers, but he could feel no dip beneath the tapestry that would belie its existence. While he scrambled among the alcoves, Thor had gained on him and stood yards away in front of a great stained-glass window.

“Monster!” he accused. “Father should have killed you all when he had the chance!”

“Thor!” Loki’s voice cracked. “Thor, it’s me! Your brother, Loki!”

Thor raised his hammer and Loki turned to run, but Mjolnir shot true and the trickster dropped to his knees, paralyzed by electric shock. His body jerked through the sparking bonds as the boots of his once-brother knocked toward him.

“My brother… I have no brother, creature. Only the deceit that your kind sustains can account for this. Father of lies. Born of murderers.”

He towered over Loki’s helpless form and raised his hammer once more.

“I told my father I would hunt down the frost giants and slay them all,” he growled. “Starting with you!”

With a grunt, Thor slammed the hammer down.

~*~

Clutching the bed sheets, Loki woke to shrieking vibration tearing itself from his throat. Mugginess on his face cooled quickly in the frigid quarters. He struggled to breathe, sitting up slowly in the silence. The fire had died out, leaving his room crypt-like in its stillness.

Thor couldn’t know. Loki had only just found out, and didn’t confront Odin until after Thor’s banishment. Besides, Thor loved him, didn’t he?

Weren’t they raised as brothers?

But that might not count. The repulsion of sharing his childhood with a monster might be enough to—

Never mind. As long as Thor stayed on Midgard, it would not matter.

Loki snapped his fingers to stoke the hot embers in the fireplace then felt around with his toes until he found his boots. He pulled them on and stood, straightening his jacket.

Father or not, Odin had entrusted him with keeping the peace between Asgard and Jotunheim when he was just a boy. He owed Laufey a visit.


End file.
